Saturday, 28 October 2017

What We're Watching 28/10/17

What We're Watching

28/10/17

Middle-Earth: Shadow of War.

You know, I've surprised myself, I actually really enjoy Shadow of War. This doesn't make its business model any less grotesquely unethical, in fact it arguably makes it worse by tarnishing a game that would otherwise be a contender for one of my best games of the year, but it does come as something of a surprise.

The game is actually really addictive, largely because of the nemesis system: Not every nemesis is especially interesting, but a few -- an orc captain who killed me and then, after I burned them to death as revenge, came back as 'the Flame of War', referring to me as their 'little moth' and ranting about the power if fire; an orc titled 'the Agoniser' who ponders philosophical questions during the fight, and accuses Talion and Celebrimbor of being racist; and one particular orc who referred to us as 'my love' and begged us to 'kill him slowly.'

I'm not very far into the game: I've played it for about eight hours and am just creeping up on the end of the first act, and I gather it becomes a bit more repetitive and frustrating later on, so my opinion my yet change.

Once Upon A Time S7.

So, Once Upon A Time is trundling along, this time with an episode tying up the loose end of Rumple and Belle's relationship. Long story short, they build a house at the end of the world, eventually Belle dies, and Rumple discovers that he's meant to give the Dark One's knife to either Alice (of Alice in Wonderland) or Henry.

Thus far, the story is very much in the mold of the first series' story, and one presumes it might well end the same way, but the introduction of the 'guardian' of the Dark One's knife is an interesting one. If it's Alice, this could potentially set us up for a new villain, and if it's Henry, it might be setting us up for him struggling with the powers of the Dark One.

Either way, it likely means that Rumple isn't going to survive past the end of this series -- most likely he'll end up passing on the knife to someone and then immediately dying.

Garo: Vanishing Line.

Garo: Vanishing Line is -- definitely an anime that's airing currently, I suppose.

It's odd, but I have no strong views of any particular type on it. It's there, it's perfectly enjoyable to watch, and it really leaves no particular lasting impressions of any kind. It has neither great highs nor great lows. It isn't memorable, but it isn't boring either.

I've never encountered a series before that's so aggressively just there, doing nothing in particular and failing to be worthy of commentary of any sort.